IN response to Mr Ogley's letter (May 23), I wish to explain what City of York Council is doing in terms of recycling garden waste.

This includes the following:

Our ornamental parks are starting to compost garden waste produced during park maintenance.

For years we have recycled most of tree prunings, by chipping and using them as mulch on shrub beds.

We have a green waste skip, which is filled with garden waste by mobile crews working across the city.

The council has, for years, been working with parish councils to arrange separate green waste collections

Green waste is separated from all the council's household waste and sent for composting

From October this year the council will be introducing green waste collections to 60,000 properties with gardens.

On the subject of non-collection of grass cuttings, we cut in the region of 38 million square metres of grass each year on open areas such as grass verges, and the increased costs for collection and disposal makes this financially impossible.

However, we have increased the frequency of grass cuts from ten a year to 14, which results in fewer cuttings being left, and each machine carries a mechanical blower for clearing large amounts of grass off pavements. We have also improved our gully cleaning processes and are not aware of any smelly drains in Alcuin Avenue.

Problems can be reported via the York Pride action line on (01904) 551551.

Russell Stone,

General manager, Street Scene,

City of York Council,

Foss Island's Depot,

York.

Updated: 09:39 Friday, May 27, 2005